dozen avenues to fortune opened before him, and he felt that his only task was to choose, believing that in some indefinite yet easily discerned way he would achieve more than falls to the lot of most men to accomplish.  Instead of a long, sleepless night like those which had preceded, his waking dreams ended in quiet and equally pleasant visions—­then oblivion, which did not pass away until the morning sun was shining.  But with the new day came a new access of pain and gloom, and the aid of the magic little instrument was invoked once more.  Again within a few moments the potent drug produced a tranquil elysium and a transformed world of grand possibilities.  With a vigor which seemed boundless, and hopes which repeated disappointments could not dampen, he continued his quest for employment until in the declining day his spirits and energy ebbed as strangely as they had risen in the morning, and after another night of dreams and stupor he awoke in torture.  The powerful stimulant enabled him to repeat the experiences of the previous day, and for two or three weeks he lived in the fatal but fascinating opium paradise, gradually increasing the amount of morphia that his system, dulled by habit, demanded.  In the meantime, by the lavish use of quinine he gradually banished his neuralgia with its attendant pain.

It is well known to those familiar with the character of opium that its effects are greatly enhanced at first by any decided change in the method of its use; also that its most powerful and immediate influences can be produced solely by the hypodermic needle, since by means of it the stimulant is introduced at once into the system.  When taken in powders, the glow, the serenity, and exaltation come on more slowly, and more gradually pass away, causing alternations of mood far less noticeable than those produced by immediate injection of the poison.  Therefore it was not at all strange that Mr. Jocelyn’s family should remain in complete ignorance of the habit which was enslaving him, or that his behavior failed to excite the faintest suspicion of the threatening influences at work.  There is no vice so secret as that of the opium slave’s, none that is in its earlier stages more easily and generally concealed from those who are nearest and dearest.  The changes produced in Mr. Jocelyn were very gradual, and seeing him daily even his loving wife did not note them.

During the period of unnatural exaltation that has been described he had accepted agencies which promised thousands if he could sell millions of dollars’ worth of goods, and after the subtle morphia had infused itself through his system nothing seemed easier; but dreams are not realities, and after grand hopes unfulfilled, and futile efforts, he would sink into a despondency from which nothing could lift him save the little syringe that he carried hidden next to his heart.  As its magic never failed him, he went on for a time, blind to the consequences.  At last he began to